John despises his Alabama town and decides to do something about it. He asks a reporter to investigate the son of a wealthy family who’s allegedly been bragging that he got away with murder. But then someone else ends up dead,
sparking a nasty feud, a hunt for hidden treasure, and an unearthing of the mysteries of one man’s life.

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Chapter VII

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About the Show

S-Town is a new podcast from Serial and This American Life, hosted by Brian Reed, about a man named John who despises his Alabama town and decides to do something about it. He asks Brian to investigate the son of a wealthy family who’s allegedly been bragging that he got away with murder. But then someone else ends up dead, and the search for the truth leads to a nasty feud, a hunt for hidden treasure, and an unearthing of the mysteries of one man’s life.

Brian, a longtime This American Life producer, started reporting this story more than three years ago, when he got an email from John with the subject line “John B McLemore lives in Shittown Alabama.”

S-Town is part of Serial Productions, a production company from Serial and This American Life.

Credits

Brian Reed

Host and Executive Producer

Brian Reed is the senior producer of the public radio show and podcast This American Life. In his seven years with the show, he has created some of the program's most ambitious stories, including “The Secret Recordings of Carmen Segarra,”an investigation into the Federal Reserve’s supervision of Goldman Sachs; “Cops See It Differently,”a nuanced look at the relationship between African Americans and the police; “Abdi and the Golden Ticket,”which follows a Somali refugee desperately trying to get to America; and “What Happened at Dos Erres,”the story of a massacre in Guatemala and its reverberations decades later, which earned him a Peabody Award.

Julie Snyder

Executive Producer

Julie Snyder has been the guiding force behind two of the most successful ventures in audio broadcasting: she is the co-creator of the podcast Serial, which debuted in October 2014 and has been downloaded more than 200 million times, making it the most listened-to podcast in history. Before that, for many years, she was the senior producer of This American Life, which is heard by more than 4 million listeners each week.

Additional Credits

Ira Glass

Editorial Advisor

Sarah Koenig

Editorial Advisor

Neil Drumming

Editorial Advisor

Whitney Dangerfield

Digital Editor

Seth Lind

Director of Operations

Rich Orris

Web Development

Studio Rodrigo

Web Design

Benjamin Phelan

Fact-Checking and Research

Valero Doval

Illustrations

Starlee Kine

Story Consultant

Lyra Smith

Audio Mixing

Matt Tierney

Technical Director

Damien Graef

Music Supervisor

Julie Whitaker

Digital Manager

Emily Condon

Line Producer

Elise Bergerson

Business Manager

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Music Credits

Daniel Hart

Daniel Hart, a performer and composer from Dallas, Texas, composed the S-Town theme. He has toured and recorded with St. Vincent, the Polyphonic Spree, Broken Social Scene, Other Lives, and many more. For the past five years, Daniel has been composing music for film and TV, including Disney’s Pete’s Dragon and the documentary Eating Animals. Daniel and his band, Dark Rooms, are currently finishing their second album.

Matt McGinley is the drummer and a co-founder of the band Gym Class Heroes, as well as a contributing music producer for This American Life.

Helado Negro

Helado Negro is the music and performance alias of Roberto Carlos Lange. His compositions are made using computers, voice, and field recordings. Raised in South Florida, Roberto sings in English and Spanish and infuses his music with his parents’ Ecuadorian culture of boleros, baladas, and Caribbean dance music. Pitchfork gave his album Private Energy 2016 an 8.1 and praised his song “It’s My Brown Skin” as a “Best New Track” in October 2016.

Trey Pollard

Trey Pollard is a musician and composer and a co-owner of Spacebomb in Richmond, Va. He works as a performer, arranger, and musical director with such artists as Matthew E. White, the Waterboys, Helado Negro, Foxygen, and Cocoon, and for labels including Columbia Records, Universal Records, Jagjaguwar, and Domino Records.

Additional Credit: Christina Azarian

Song at the End of Each Chapter: “A Rose for Emily,” The Zombies

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All chapters are available now. You can listen to S-Town right here on our site, and via many podcast apps.

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How do I get a podcast?

Here’s a video we made before Serial launched. Follow the instructions, but substitute S-Town for Serial. Don’t want to watch a video? Read below!

A podcast is essentially a radio show that you can get on the internet, so you can listen any time you want. You have two options: You can listen to a podcast through a website (this is called streaming). Or, you can download a podcast, which means you’re saving it on your phone, or tablet, or computer, and you can listen to it any time, even without an internet connection.

For iPhones and iPads, use the Apple Podcasts app. This comes installed on most Apple devices. In the Podcasts app you search for S-Town and then hit subscribe. You can also go directly to the S-Town page.